


i'm begging you please to take my hand (wreck my plans)

by Sapphicsarah



Category: The Closer
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-13 19:36:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28783548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphicsarah/pseuds/Sapphicsarah
Summary: To say that they didn’t start off on the right foot would be the understatement of the century.
Relationships: Brenda Leigh Johnson/Sharon Raydor
Comments: 28
Kudos: 58





	1. Chapter 1

_I'm like the water when your ship rolled in that night_ _  
Rough on the surface but you cut through like a knife  
And if it was an open-shut case  
I never would've known from that look on your face_

 _Willow -_ Taylor Swift 

To say that they didn’t start off on the right foot would be the understatement of the century.

It was late, and everyone was on edge and she had swanned in with her FID goons trailing behind her like a queen with her guards. Her skin looked soft and light and normally anyone in hospital lighting in the middle of the night looked absolutely awful.

She didn’t even look tired.

She glided past Brenda with a single, sharp glance, and it went through Brenda like a hot knife.

She waited until Detective Gabriel was herded toward the breathalyzer, then came to stand in front of Brenda so that they were toe to toe. Brenda’s team had sent the Captain on a wild goose chase to another hospital, and she knew it. She detailed the miscommunication in a clear, velvety voice and each syllable made the knife twist and a shiver went down Brenda’s back. For a moment she’d thought they could work together, them being women in the boy’s club and all. But it just wasn’t meant to be.

The Captain’s cold, deliberate way of speaking made Brenda want to reach over and yank on her hair, like some child on the playground yanking on another girl’s ponytail. And perhaps it was this, the strength of her reaction to the woman that made her pull rank. She wasn’t used to people slithering under her skin so quickly. It was positively humiliating.

The other woman didn’t even seem to notice, she just raised her eyebrows when she annunciated the word “Chief.” Then she said she had work to do and left with the prettiest fake smile you ever did see. She could almost be mistaken for a Southerner.

Watching her lose control in Pope’s office the next day was almost fun. Brenda could see her start to unravel, as if this was the first time another officer had stood up to her. Brenda doubted the Captain got through many days without one police officer or another giving her a hard time. But it was satisfying to watch in creeping fascination, as the Captain’s face that looked quite different without her glasses, became more and more irritated as the meeting went on. And then she interrupted, and Brenda pointed it out and Captain Raydor did something she probably rarely did, which was to raise her voice.

“I must go first!” She nearly shouted.

Brenda had to stop herself from grinning and licked her lips instead.

“My investigation must go first!”

But then, like magic, she was put together again in a matter of seconds. She called Brenda’s tactics to pull rank embarrassing and Brenda’s fascination vanished and was instantly replaced by anger.

Later in the hallway, the Captain offered up what she probably thought was an olive branch. It only made Brenda’s anger, which now felt like a tiny flame in her chest, flare up. The situation was almost unbearable.

“You stay out of my way, Captain, and I’ll stay out of yours,” she said with a fake smile of her own.

The Captain’s face fell, and for a moment Brenda almost felt homicidal.

“Well, I tried,” Raydor said, as if it had been a great burden to extend the professional courtesy. She walked away and through the doors and Brenda could hear Taylor prattling on about that awful woman being able to carry a grudge.

“Well,” Brenda scoffed, “she better get ready for some heavy liftin’.” 

No, they definitely didn’t start off on the right foot.

…

The second time they met the Captain came out of nowhere.

Brenda wanted to strangle her, as the woman immediately began giving orders and putting up red tape and strutting around in her high heels and immaculate navy trench coat. She was furious by the time the woman insisted on questioning the dead officer’s integrity and asked Brenda to step into her command post.

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” she said with both hands up and promptly dismissed the conversation all together and turned right around and walked back toward her squad.

Later, the Captain short stopped her interrogation with a notification and dismissed the very notion that their suspect could possibly be in a gang.

“Bitch,” she muttered under her breath.

Then she stole evidence, slowing them down with an excuse so flimsy that Brenda just walked away. Of course that woman followed, hot on her heels. They talked over each other in Pope’s office, getting louder and louder and Brenda just wanted to smack her. Pull her hair. Do something to get her to be quiet.

She kept following her, like an insistent and very frustrating shadow.

At this point Brenda was certain she’d developed a sixth sense for the woman. She felt _something_ , the room changed somehow, and she looked up and there the Captain was. Like a pebble in her shoe.

“Can you, uh, get Captain Raydor to stop following me?” she asked Commander Taylor.

When he said he couldn’t Brenda got the room riled up instead, just to spite the woman. She supposed she should feel a little guilty, the Captain was just trying to do her job. But she was so irritating, it was hard not to get angry at the very thought of her. And anyway, the Murder Room was too full of other people. Other divisions, their administrative staff and who knows what, and her. They were all crammed in to where there was normally just her squad, all tucked up and cozy. Brenda loathed when things were all out of place and discombobulated, people in her space, making a mess of things. She couldn’t think straight.

Eventually they got them. Although it was a struggle, from what Brenda heard.

Captain Raydor had said it would happen, that there would be a confrontation with police if they left the car there. The consequences had not interested her much, and Raydor had seemed almost shocked at her indifference. Their suspects were racists, and the day Brenda started worrying about the wellbeing of racists would be the day she quit being Chief. And she’d never quit that.

Raydor went into the interrogation room because of something her little rule book said. One of the suspects had a little welt that was rapidly becoming a black eye. He banged his head on the table and growled, and Captain Radyor did not even flinch. The woman just asked him to smile and took his picture and promptly left the room. Brenda could not help but be a little begrudgingly impressed.

By the end of the investigation the police officers were cleared of all charges, the murderers confessed on tape in the back of a car, and Raydor had her own car to get to the funeral. They still did not get along, despite both shared investigations ending somewhat satisfactorily. At least Chief Pope was pleased.

That night she dreamed of the surveillance van. The feeling of the Captain sitting next to her in the dark, the smell of her shampoo filing up the air, and the sound of heels following her everywhere.

…

The third time they met Captain Raydor came to her. Or rather, to Chief Pope, who assigned Major Crimes a case that Brenda had no intention of taking seriously. It came back to haunt her when Ally Moore’s husband ended up dead.

The Captain had seemed almost delicate in Pope’s office. Fraying at the edges, her eyes worried, and her voice getting choked up at the thought of an officer in danger. Her face all scrunched up as she asked Brenda to see past the obstacles in this particular case.

“The obstacles that you’re talking about are the justice system,” Brenda pointed out. She appreciated the poetry in it, Captain Raydor and all her rules, willing to bend them for someone she cared about. Perhaps they weren’t so different after all.

Taylor suggested they interview Ally Moore together and suddenly there they were in the interrogation room, Captain Raydor reaching out to hold her officer’s hand. It didn’t take long for everything to unravel. All the things that had rubbed her the wrong way throughout the case became clear when Ally Moore said her gun was in her car.

Brenda felt, more than saw Captain Raydor go still.

For a moment she felt pity for the Captain, but only for a moment. Having one of your own, especially a handpicked and trusted officer betray you like that? Well, Brenda wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

As they stepped out and looked at each other Brenda felt that knife, that flame, that feeling come back to life, although Brenda was beginning to suspect it never really went away at all.

“Chief Johnson,” Raydor began immediately, “I have some serious concerns about Sergeant Dunn’s original statement.”

“Why Captain?” They were walking together now, shoulder to shoulder down the hall, and for a moment Brenda thought their arms would touch. “Because of everything he accomplished in the very short amount of time before backup arrived, or is it the contradictory physical evidence from the morgue, or could it be the placement of Detective Moore’s gun?”

Brenda watched as Captain Raydor nodded. “Well, I am curious as to why Detective Moore and Sergeant Dunn’s statements regarding her weapon are so drastically different.”

“It’s the one question they didn’t expect us to ask,” she replied.

“So you believe that they knew another prior to this to this incident.”

“Oh, yes Captain, I do,” she said as they rounded a corner.

And just like the gun in Captain Raydor’s hands as they did their little demonstration in the morgue, everything clicked into place. It was exhilarating, suddenly working together towards something they both wanted. Their single-minded approaches had the same destination for once, and Brenda almost enjoyed the predatory nature of Raydor as she circled her former protegee, like a shark that smelled blood in the water.

But later the Captain walked it all back, giving a polite apology for being a bitch the entire investigation. Brenda heard herself say they just didn’t like each other and watched from across the desk as the Captain agreed with a little relieved laugh.

“That is a very difficult dynamic to change,” she said with a smile. This time it wasn’t fake. Brenda smiled back.

“It is.”

The pain in her chest eased a little as Brenda watched her leave. Perhaps it really was just that. Perhaps they really just didn’t like each other.

…

The thing was the death of Shawn Moore could have been avoided. As Chief Pope yelled, and Captain Raydor later reiterated, Brenda hadn’t interviewed him because the Captain had suggested it. This was the second time her actions, or rather inactions had had consequences Captain Raydor had been able to see a mile off. Although Brenda hadn’t cared the first time around. But this time an innocent man had died, and that feeling lingered. She hated that the Captain had been right, even if she didn’t say _I told you so_ when she could have.

Fritz’s voice echoed in her head.

_You would never ignore the husband._

He had asked her to quit. Well, not asked exactly, but suggested it. The notion was like a punch to the gut, a rug being pulled out from underneath her. It reminded her of all the times Fritz had poked and prodded at her for being late or for forgetting an appointment. Every time he had sighed and moped and dragged his feet. All the times he had made the silence between them louder than anything Brenda had ever heard. She didn’t know what to do with it, all this anger and frustration that seemed to be pouring out of him. He had been leaving notes, peppering cryptic sentences throughout their conversations. Picking up her messes and making her feel guilty for living in her own home.

All of these things were little nothings by themselves. But this suggestion, whether in jest or not was certainly something. It hammered home the thought that had been nagging her since they’d gotten married. Or maybe even earlier than that, maybe when they’d gotten engaged. And the thought was that her husband didn’t really know her. Or at least didn’t see her the way other people did. Her work was everything, to leave it would be like dying.

Eventually she sat down with the bag from the Cuban Chicken place and asked him point blank about the promotion. He was gentle and kind and it reminded her of what he used to be like when they’d just started out, before everything had gotten so complicated and hard. He reached out across the table and took her hand, just like Captain Raydor had reached out to Detective Moore. She felt her hand clench.

“Maybe I’ve been irritable about just the idea of asking you to choose between me and your career because I didn’t know which one you’d pick.”

His face was open, in a way it hadn’t been in so long, and he seemed so very sad. Brenda couldn’t take it. It was just one more thing to feel guilty about in the long line of things Fritz held onto tighter than anything.

In all their time together she hadn’t changed, and despite Fritz’s expectations, Brenda thought she probably never would. So she felt herself do what she always did when sat across a table from a person she wanted something from.

She lied.

Only this time, she sealed it with a kiss. 


	2. Chapter 2

_Oh, goddamn_   
_My pain fits in the palm of your freezing hand_   
_Taking mine, but it's been promised to another_   
_Oh, I can't_   
_Stop you putting roots in my dreamland_   
_My house of stone, your ivy grows_   
_And now I'm covered in you_

_Ivy -_ Taylor Swift 

The new building was the worst thing to happen to Brenda in a long time.

Her whole life was packed up in boxes. Some of the boxes were scattered around her house, here there and everywhere. Most of them were still in her car, stacked up on top of each other in such a way that it was nearly impossible to see out the rear window as she backed out of her drive every morning. Only a few of the boxes had made it to her office, and Fritz was getting anxious about it.

They’d been fine lately. Not great. But fine.

Life had been so crazy with all that moving that Brenda had almost completely forgotten about Captain Raydor. Then there she was, with a notepad and a smile so alarming that Brenda put on her favorite cardigan just to ward it off.

The woman kept scribbling, asking probing questions about Chief Pope and smiling at the oddest times. She hummed every now and again but didn’t look up, the gentle _hm_ drifting between them as Brenda got more and more irritated at being in the dark.

The captain brought up the affair and Brenda felt her mouth hang open for a few seconds too many. How long was that stupid mistake going to follow her? She’d never be rid of it, although she didn’t do herself any favors by moving to California on Will’s invitation. He’d given her Major Crimes, and for that she was grateful, but in that moment, it truly wasn’t worth the look in Raydor’s narrowing, calculating eyes.

“Captain Raydor I’m finding these questions extremely personal,” she said.

The Captain had the gall to laugh. “I assure you,” she said with a smile, “if it were personal, I would not be here.”

She tucked her hair behind her ear as she listened to Brenda, looked around the office as she went on and on, and somehow invited herself along on an investigation before Brenda even knew what hit her.

The sun in the captain’s hair made it look even more red, instead of the rich brunette Brenda had always thought it to be. There were layers of it, and a slight breeze tugged at the locks as they walked over to the Disken’s house. She was still asking questions, dressed in a lilac jacket that made Brenda feel awfully frumpy in comparison.

“What are you writin’ down?” she huffed, turning around to face her. Captain Raydor just tucked the little pad behind her back. She could feel Detective Gabriel watching them, but that didn’t stop her from glaring right back as the Captain stared her down.

She kept needling, interrupting, questioning, and Brenda felt her patience wearing thin. She slammed a door into the Captain’s face and brazenly picked a lock in front of her. They found the nanny, but Brenda didn’t feel vindicated, just even more frustrated. And a little hollowed out by the look on Captain Raydor’s face as she turned and walked out of the apartment after seeing the body.

She’d taken her own car, something they’d carried over since the last parallel investigation they’d worked together. It had been months since they’d last seen each other, but Raydor had remembered to bring her own car. Brenda half expected her to just leave, but she came back into the apartment after maybe five minutes. She wondered briefly if the Captain was all right, her face looked a little pale and withdrawn. Brenda didn’t stop to ask. And anyway, the notepad made a reappearance almost immediately and the scribbling continued and the Captain was her shadow once more. 

…

She hadn’t known the Captain was there when they rescued the women in the truck, or that she’d arrived before they’d even killed the Immigrations Officer. Brenda was trying to control the situation, but really she was just watching her squad give orders, fending off Fritz who would need to be questioned regarding his role in the investigation, and watching Raydor watch her.

She was so tired.

And hungry.

She’d kill for some chocolate but all she had was the relief in the women’s faces as they climbed into ambulances and the sound of Captain Raydor’s voice encouraging them as they went. She had helped herd them into the rigs, placed blankets over them and took their names down, finally putting that little notepad to good use. Brenda felt a little aimless in the chaos and kept looking around and seeing Raydor glance back at her every now and then. It was as if they were both waiting for some other catastrophe to hit them, or for the sky to fall and crush them into the pavement.

But the sky didn’t fall, at least not until Raydor handed her an application for Chief of the LAPD.

“Two weeks, Chief Johnson,” she said in that husky voice of hers that rubbed Brenda exactly the wrong way.

She reached for some chocolate as soon as the Captain was gone and ate it so fast she didn’t even savor it.

…

She didn’t see the Captain again for a while. It was funny that they’d both been high ranking women in the force but hadn’t crossed paths. She had heard of Captain Raydor of course but had never really given her another thought beyond the knowledge that she existed. Brenda supposed it was coincidence that they had never seen each other in the hallway or in the elevators or at a special event. But now, in this new building that was more of a maze than a headquarters, it seemed downright ridiculous that they had never met prior to Detective Gabriel having an FID investigation.

She kept seeing the woman at the other end of long corridors. Twice she saw her in the morning on the walk from the parking lot that was still an inconvenient distance away from the new building. Once they were in the same elevator, although there were lots of other people there too. Brenda had pressed the button for her floor and had glanced over at the woman, who gave her that small smile and nodded. They didn’t speak, and why would they? It wasn’t like they were friends or anything. The people in the lift filed out floor by floor and then Brenda’s floor came, and she didn’t even look back to say goodbye.

They weren’t friends. She didn’t have to say hello and goodbye every time they saw each other. Her mother would be mortified by her behavior, but her mother wasn’t here, and her mother had never met Captain Raydor. Brenda disliked the idea of them meeting, and shook her head as she rifled through her bag trying to find the keycard to let her into Major Crimes.

They kept running into each other and so Brenda kept thinking about her, sometimes at the oddest moments. She had fought with Fritz about the job. They fought more and more these days, but this one was a doozy. Brenda had taken to carrying around the folder with the application in her purse, and it felt a bit like when Raydor had been following her those first few times they met. Like Brenda was carrying Sharon Raydor with her everywhere.

When she had finally handed it in everything changed. She realized that the whole thing was rather ridiculous, and in fact she didn’t want the job. Then came the sinking realization that if she was offered Chief she would have to take it.

Everyone had their own opinions. Everything seemed like a foregone conclusion. 

Fritz wanted her to be chief, of course. The job came with bodyguards, apparently.

Taylor wanted Pope to be Chief so Brenda could be Assistant Chief so Taylor could finally have what _he_ had always wanted, which was Major Crimes.

And Pope wanted to be Chief because it had been his dream for years. He would finally be Chief of Police and she would take his place as Assistant Chief. He was just keeping the seat warm for her.

Neither Lieutenant Taylor nor Pope had even considered her an option. And of course, she would never have encouraged the thought, at least not before Captain Raydor.

Things kept changing and Brenda hated change, so she decided not to think about the whole Chief business until Raydor came back and demanded she prepare for an interview with the Mayor.

“Well, can’t I skip the whole prep part? I’ll just go in there and be myself?”

“That is a terrible idea,” Captain Raydor said immediately. No one else said anything, and Brenda supposed that was that.

…

They spent most of the afternoon in Brenda’s office. Brenda biting her lip and the Captain dragging her through the mud. Talking about clothes and purses and first impressions and all kinds of things that Brenda just didn’t think about very much. She supposed that was why the Captain was there, belittling her. Trying to help in some round about way that involved the Captain glaring at Brenda’s purse like it was infected with some deadly disease. Telling her she wasn’t fashion forward, political, well-liked or friendly.

All these things Brenda knew, but had never bothered to change or address. She had gotten along just fine before all this. Hopefully it would be fine after. It really was just a short meeting in the afternoon. A quick little chemistry test, and then it would all be over and things could go back to the way they were.

She didn’t want to be Chief of Police, but she could go along with it, please the Captain.

Wear the dress.

She decided it would be a dress, rather than a suit or skirt and blouse. The Captain’s pantsuits were striking, especially the one she had worn today with the strips and the white shirt. But to wear something like that wouldn’t be capitalizing on her feminine strengths, or whatever nonsense Raydor had said.

She tried on a few, looking in the mirror this way and that. They were formal and professional but not quite what she was looking for. The dresses didn’t scream “woman capable of handling a lot of power.”

The red dress was in the back of her closet, half buried and tucked away. It was still as sleek as ever, and Brenda thought for sure the Captain would never see it coming. She slipped into it, standing in front of the mirror as she brought the zipper up. She spun around and put up her hair and wondered what the Captain would think of her now. Maybe she was just a stalking horse to Raydor too, a candidate the Captain championed solely because she was a woman.

Then she remembered the sound of Raydor’s voice, soft and kind, telling her she was brave. It felt like a long time ago now, though it had only been a few months.

She took off the dress and hung it up and went into the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face. Afterwards, she climbed into bed and looked once again at the dress hanging in the closet. She drifted off while she gazed at it and was fast asleep long before Fritz came home.

…

It was wrong to be disappointed by Raydor’s lack of reaction.

_You look great._

That was it?

Brenda was busy enough that she could ignore that sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. Maybe it was just nerves, anxiety, and discomfort at so many people looking at her as she walked from her car to the building. There was a reason she never dressed up at work, and people’s lingering looks was one of them. The Captain didn’t linger, only gave a little satisfied smile and wanted Brenda to join her for breakfast. The case wasn’t wrapped up, so she ignored the invitation and kept working until they got their confession.

And then they had a moment in her office. A brief moment, but it was something.

“Do you really not want to be Chief of Police?”

Brenda watched as the Captain sat down and looked at her. She placed her hands on her hips, just like the Captain was wont to do and squared her shoulders.

“No, I don’t.”

Then, a quick look behind the veil. The Captain revealing a part of herself Brenda hadn’t yet seen.

“You don’t think that I wanted to spend my career in Internal Affairs, doing a job that leaves me disliked and mistrusted by my fellow officers every day of my life? No, I chose I.A. because I thought it was the quickest way to achieve rank.”

They’d never spoken like this and Brenda watched the woman a little dazedly.

“And I also thought it’d be good for the Department to see a woman’s in a Captain’s uniform,” the Captain continued.

And of course she ruined the moment by bringing up her affair with Will. But the reference was fleeting and then the Captain’s eyes were welling up and she sounded like she had on that night when Brenda had almost died.

“But I personally will feel very…”

Brenda watched her take a breath.

The silence hung between them and they watched each other. They always seemed to be watching each other.

_Oh for heaven’s sakes._

“I will feel very proud, to have a Chief I can truly admire.”

She took a beat to respond and felt her face turn up in a smile. Maybe they were friends?

The Captain reached out a hand for Brenda to take.

They’d never touched deliberately before. Brushes of shoulders and arms as they walked next to each other in the corridor, or when they’d been circling a body at a crime scene. A brush of the fingers as she passed her a part of a gun in the morgue. But never like this.

Brenda took the Captain’s hand and was surprised at how small it was. Her skin was cool to the touch, and so smooth Brenda assumed she must use some expensive lotion on them every night. She didn’t squeeze tight, or even very firmly. Just let it rest in the Captain’s palm for a moment until the other woman gave a little squeeze and let her hand drop.

“It’s my pleasure, Chief,” she said as she looked intently into Brenda’s eyes.

Then she smiled and Brenda smiled back. It was all too much, so she looked away and tucked a nonexistent stray lock of hair behind her ear. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail to accentuate her feminine features. She hoped the Captain appreciated her efforts.

She reached into her purse and pulled out the snakeskin handbag. When she turned to look back the Captain gave her a little grin that was familiar in the most unfamiliar way that Brenda couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“See ya,” she said in lieu of anything coherent as the Captain watched her leave.

All she could think about as she crossed the street was the feeling of the Captain’s freezing hands in her own.

…

It was wrong to be fixated on the feeling of another woman’s hand in her own. It had only been a few weeks, but the Murder Room felt a little empty without her haunting it. She was glad to be rid of her, despite all the progress they’d made. It was still wrong to think of it, so Brenda ate another Kit Kat and tried to focus on anything else.

It was wrong.

Of course right and wrong had seemed a little fuzzy for years now. Going all the way back to the CIA. These things blurred together, and sometimes it was difficult to see the way forward.

She had started to see patterns of her own behavior, despite not wanting to see them.

Her entire squad wanted to tie up a case in a pretty little bow when a grandmother had killed her ex-daughter-in-law. The woman had done it to protect her granddaughter, but it still made her a murderer just the same. Brenda had seen her influence on all her squad’s faces, as she looked them in the eye one by one.

“This isn’t the kind of decision we make on our own,” she said, even though she agreed. They could easily forget about it, walk away and no one else in the world would be the wiser.

And if she heard Captain Raydor’s voice in her head, telling her it was the right call- well! No one had to know about that neither.

Sometimes the right decision was the wrong one, even when it felt right or looked right on paper. Taking a murder victim’s heart and shoving it into the body of a little girl so that the little girl could live was the wrong one. But Brenda found herself waiting anxiously in the hospital corridor, pacing back and forth until the surgeon emerged with a reassuring smile on his face.

What did it matter where the heart was? In evidence lockup it did no one any good. At least this way someone benefitted from the murder.

What was one more indiscretion? One more slipup of wrong from right. She’d just interviewed for Chief and she didn’t want it. And before all that she’d done something that would probably constitute as very wrong. Leaving Turrell Baylor at his doorstep with death lingering around every corner in the face of his former friends. Closing in, until the house was surrounded and the street was lined with them.

Sanchez had agreed to let the phone call happen and Gabriel drove the car to drop him off. She’d wondered briefly what Captain Raydor would say, but let the thought leave her as quickly as it had come. The Captain wasn’t there, and all that Chief business still had to happen.

Gabriel hesitated, the car running and the air getting thicker and thicker. It was so hot that the pavement was almost steaming.

“David I want to leave,” she said.

So they did.

It was wrong, but she did it anyway.


	3. Chapter 3

_Sorry for not making you my centerfold_   
_Over and over_   
_Lost again with no surprises_   
_Disappointments, close your eyes_   
_And it gets colder and colder_   
_When the sun goes down_

_Coney Island_ \- Taylor Swift 

Her cell phone went off in the middle of the night. It so often did, but Brenda was still half asleep and assumed it was one of her team, so she didn’t check the Caller ID until she heard Captain Raydor’s voice on the other end of the line.

“Chief?” The Captain’s voice was hesitant, like she was embarrassed to have to call so late.

It felt intimate and strange to be hearing her voice so late at night, when Brenda still had one foot in dreamland.

“Yes Captain, what is it?” she mumbled after a moment, rolling over to see that Fritz was still asleep and snoring. She sat up and padded quietly to the kitchen, turning on the light as she went.

“I’m sorry to call so late, Chief. It’s Lieutenant Flynn. He’s been stabbed and is on his way to Cedars.”

She said it so calmly that for a moment Brenda didn’t fully grasp what she was saying. It was late, but hardly as late as she’d originally thought. She checked the clock above the stove. Only just gone half eleven. She must have been exhausted to be so deeply asleep by then. Before she could ask anything, the Captain steamrolled right on through whatever this conversation was. A notification? A professional courtesy?

“He should be fine, but he did pass out at the scene,” the Captain reported. “He gave his statement before, but I knew you’d want to be informed as soon as possible…” Her voice faded a way with a hint of uncertainty.

“Yes,” Brenda said as she started at the dishes she’d left in the sink. She’d meant to clean them but had decided last minute to let them soak and wash them in the morning. They’d linger now and would be there when Fritz woke up. “Yes, Captain,” she said more firmly. “I’m on my way, thank you.”

“Sure thing, Chief,” came the Captain’s voice, smooth and calm and perfectly professional. “I’ll see you soon,” she said before ending the call.

“See you soon,” Brenda echoed to her empty kitchen.

…

Brenda didn’t like asking questions she didn’t already know the answers to, and she didn’t know why Captain Raydor was being so nice. She let them take the lead on the case, handed over evidence without a fuss, and said hello to Detective Gabriel in the hallway.

“She’s up to something,” Provenza sneered, and Brenda thought he was only half joking.

She had thought maybe the Captain was disappointed in her. Not getting the job and all. They hadn’t run into each other since Chief Delk was announced. And when Brenda had shot Kevin Mason dead FID had sent someone else to interview her. She’d expected Raydor to swan into her office, armed with her notepad and a lecture. But instead she had to talk to Sergeant Elliot. Brenda tried not to let her momentary disappointment at the sight of him fester and turn into anything else.

The Captain had been nowhere to be found after she shot a man dead in the basement of a parking garage and now she was being nice.

Fritz told her why while they were in bed together, and Brenda couldn’t even keep up with her own thoughts because why should she be thinking about that woman while her husband was kissing her?

“They’re gonna offer you Pope’s job,” he murmured into her ear with a gleeful smile that made Brenda sick to her stomach.

He kept on kissing her and she looked away as realization hit her like a freight train. “That’s why Captain Raydor let me go first last night!”

She couldn’t stay still she was so outraged. She pulled away from Fritz and promptly got out of bed.

“Well you could be her boss, she’s doing some preemptive ass kissing,” Fritz said ruefully.

Ugh! She was so mad! Why couldn’t anything be straightforward anymore?

And then Fritz brought up Will, which seemed to be his favorite topic lately. She got dressed in a huff and left him there, even though she’d promised him five minutes.

“I didn’t say when,” she rebuffed. She wondered when everything in their marriage became a negotiation. Time spent in bed for secrets, dinners spent together in strained and stilted conversation for an attempt at normalcy, dishes left in the sink for a lecture and a fight that wasn’t ever even about the dishes in the end.

Turns out Captain Raydor being nice wasn’t about just being nice either. She was investigating Andy and wasn’t that just peachy? He gets stabbed and now he’s a suspect in yet another Raydor parallel investigation.

“So you’ve just been _pretending_ to be helpful here so you can investigate Andy! Is that right?” She was so mad, and she couldn’t put her finger on why. Her accent was thicker because she was so angry, and she nearly stomped her foot in irritation. Why was this affecting her so much? Why did it always have to be her?

“No that is not right,” the Captain said. And it wasn’t right. The Captain was simply trying to do what she always did, which was her job. The explanation didn’t make it any easier to send Andy home.

When he was out of the room Brenda demanded the bookkeeper’s information, and lo and behold, the Captain had already brought the small folder with her into the conference room. As if she’d known the conversation would lead right here, them standing alone in a room of glass and working together again. Brenda almost always knew how a conversation was going to turn out, but here she was, surprised by the Captain.

She picked up the folder the Captain had slid across the table and glanced down at the address and picture.

“You cannot ask her anything about her upcoming testimony,” Raydor reminded her a little too earnestly.

Brenda bristled at the implication and spoke without really thinking. “Oh I’m not gonna ask her anything about anything.”

“No?”

“No,” Brenda repeated. “Floria Stenzel’s gonna come talk to me.”

…

Eventually, the case was over. Floria came to Brenda and then so did Jeff. Then Captain Raydor and Fritz arrested Jeff in the storage unit. It was strange to see them standing side by side, although Brenda knew they’d met before. A couple times, in fact. But never the three of them all together on an investigation. It made Brenda feel all itchy.

She walked into the interview room and forgot about everything else until Rick Zuman confessed. Dumping the pile of money onto the table and taunting him until he sneered in her face and doomed himself with his own arrogance. She honed in on him until his whole life unraveled in a few short minutes.

It reminded her that so many things could change. Pope could be gone in a few weeks, and Chief Delk was gonna be Chief Delk, and Fritz was probably angry with her about the dishes that were probably still in the sink unless he had cleaned them. All of that could happen but she’d still have this, she’d still be able to catch a killer in a lie.

Captain Raydor walked into her office with that big folder in her hands. 

“I thought that you’d like this back,” she said with an uncharacteristically friendly smile. “Flynn’s package,” she said as she handed it over. “He’s completely cleared.”

“Thank you,” Brenda said as she took the bulky folder and set it down on her desk.

“Mm-hmm,” the Captain hummed, and turned as if to leave. As if that was that and they were done.

“So uh,” Brenda heard herself say before she could think to stop herself. “What’s… been going on? Why have you been so nice?”

The Captain raised her eyebrows and placed both hands in the pockets of her jacket. “I could ask the same about you,” she said.

“I’ve been nice?” Brenda asked in disbelief.

“No,” the Captain amended after a beat.

Brenda scrunched up her face and the Captain smiled at the expression.

“But uh, cooperative,” she finished a bit lamely. She shifted her weight and looked at Brenda fixedly. Like she was trying to come to some kind of decision. “I had a thought,” she said. “While Chief Delk is completing his transition plans, maybe you and I could figure out a way for F.I.D. and Major Crimes to better share their cases.”

Brenda felt her mouth hang open.

“Say, uh,” the woman fumbled. “Over a- I don’t know,” she paused. “A working lunch or-“

“Lunch?” Brenda interrupted in genuine disbelief.

“Great,” the Captain smiled, with what Brenda assumed to be willful misinterpretation of her interruption as invitation. “I’ll set it up,” she said quickly and turned again to leave.

Fritz was in the doorway and Brenda wondered how much he’d heard of their conversation. Well, even if he’d heard every word he couldn’t possibly have anything to be mad at her for. He was always saying she should have friends.

Friends have lunch don’t they? Working or otherwise.

She didn’t have anything to be guilty about this time.

Then why did she feel guilty anyway?

Fritz sat in her chair behind her desk and was talking about the winds of change and what drawer in Pope’s desk she was gonna fill up with candy. Nothing he said surprised her anymore. Everything Sharon Raydor did was a surprise. Now she’d gone and invited her to lunch. The biggest surprise of all was Brenda intended to go. And why not? She deserved a little treat now and again.

Fritz was still talking.

Brenda watched through the glass as Raydor and the squad slowly filed out of the murder room. She waited until the Captain disappeared around the corner, then she closed the blinds to her office and gave her husband five more minutes.

…

Major Crimes caught a case and Brenda had to cancel. The night before their rescheduled lunch Brenda got a text from Sharon. She was five hours in on her seventy-two hours and she was ever so sorry but they’d have to reschedule again. Then their sit-down lunch became coffee. It would be easier to meet before work at that new French Patisserie that was the opposite direction from the building but a mere five-minute walk from the parking lot.

Brenda sent a quick text at the Captain’s probably polite but unintentionally condescending reminder the night before.

_Yes, Captain. I’ll meet you there at 8 on the dot._

She set her alarm 20 minutes early, just in case.

She arrived on time, but the Captain was already sitting at a table waiting when she got there. Her hair looked particularly shiny today in the morning light. She was looking at her phone when Brenda walked in and didn’t see her approach.

“Captain?” she said in greeting.

Raydor looked up and gave her a little smile. “Chief,” she replied. “Good morning.”

“Good morning,” Brenda repeated and couldn’t help but smile back. It was a little weird to be out in public together and not working on a case. She didn’t know what to do with her hands as they waited in line to order. The Captain had hers in her pockets again, but Brenda was wearing a skirt. She smoothed her palms over the floral print and squinted up at the menu. After a moment she reached into her bag for her glasses and glanced up again at the tiny writing on the chalk board.

“I’d recommend the latte,” the Captain leaned in and murmured.

The patisserie was quiet, not yet busy at all despite the early hour. It felt intimate to be standing so close, being given advice on what to order off a menu.

Brenda hummed in acknowledgment and looked around at the other sleepy customers waiting for their caffeine. To them, Brenda and Raydor could be anyone. Two women standing side by side, their hands almost brushing as they made their way closer and closer to the counter. Brenda ordered a latte when she got there, and a pain au chocolat too.

Just the latte for the Captain, to be put in a travel mug she’d brought along with her because of course she did. She paid for both their orders before Brenda could stop her.

“That’s not really necessary,” Brenda protested politely but the card had already been put through the little machine and the Captain’s smile was nothing but friendly.

“It’s my pleasure, Chief,” she assured.

“Brenda,” she said before she’d given it a second thought.

The Captain raised her eyebrows in unhidden amusement.

“Brenda,” she said with a nod.

They waited for their coffees in pleasant silence as the small café filled up with more people. The rush hour was coming, and Brenda was glad they’d come earlier. It was out of the way for most officers on their way to work so they were unlikely to run into anyone they knew, but she was still glad they’d arrived when they had. 

“Thank you again for rescheduling,” Sharon said as they turned to walk out into the sunshine together. It was going to be a hot day even for November, and perhaps the hot latte was a mistake. But the walk was short and soon she’d be in her airconditioned office and the heat would feel miles away.

“Of course, Captain,” she said. The other woman glanced at her and tried to hide a rueful smile as she brought her travel mug to her lips.

Brenda shook her head as they walked and felt herself smile too.

“Sharon,” she said as she looked straight ahead at their shiny new building looming in the distance. The name felt strange on her tongue, smooth and pretty and strange.

They kept walking and didn’t end up saying much of anything. Supposedly they were going to work out how their departments could function better together, but the Captain didn’t bring it up and Brenda followed suit. They exchanged a few pleasantries, some questions about the case Brenda was working on. The two of them were all careful politeness and they reached the front doors sooner than Brenda expected. She couldn’t remember the last time the walk to work had gone so quickly.

“Well…” she said when they reached the elevator and Sharon hit the button. “Thank you, Sharon.”

The other woman smiled and Brenda felt herself once again smiling back.

“Let’s do it again sometime,” Sharon suggested, lifting her mug to her lips and smiling over the top as she took a sip.

“Yes,” Brenda said as the light above the door lit up and the little bell dinged softly. “Lets.”

The doors slid open and Brenda followed Sharon and stood next to her all the way up.

…

She was halfway through a case and came home to an ambush. A pretty bottle of champagne for her and sparkling water for Fritz. He toasted her being offered Pope’s job and looked at her expectantly, like he was waiting for her to say her next line in the play he’d written for them. She didn’t even like champagne.

She fiddled with her wedding ring as they argued, her hands on her lap under the table.

They’d had this argument before, gone through the same tactics over and over. She held her tongue when she thought of that, wanted to say that that was the literal definition of insanity. That they were crazy to be talking like this again about the same old thing. She tried to see the niceness in it. Her husband had bought her champagne, and wasn’t that nice?

But he didn’t want her to be chasing robbers and other heavily armed criminals anymore, as if she hadn’t been doing that since day one. She’d always been like this; she’d always done _this._ Why did he get to decide when it was time for her to stop? Time for her to change.

He didn’t want to worry about her so much. Well, how on earth was that her fault?

How did they get here after everything?

She placated him with a false promise that the van would be three blocks away and he quieted after that. He didn’t need to know that the very next morning the van was as close to the dispensary as possible.

They caught the three robbers, but the guns were fake and their story didn’t make any sense. Picking the same fight from the night before didn’t make any sense either but Fritz did it anyway.

“I don’t like Will Pope,” he said as if it wasn’t news to all of Southern California.

Brenda sighed and tried to get out of it but he kept pressing into old wounds that would have healed a long time ago if he hadn’t kept pressing into them. She scoffed at the notion that she spent most of her time worrying about what Pope wanted.

“When it comes to work, I spend most of my time wondering what I want,” she said angrily. “And you and Pope just don’t enter into it.”

She told him she resented a husband telling a wife who she can and can’t work with and he backpedaled like there was no tomorrow. He was telling her what job she should want when she was happy where she was. He couldn’t see it. Or worse, he didn’t want to see it.

…

“Were you really stuck in the ceiling?” Sharon asked in lieu of a greeting when they next had coffee.

It was so very early in the morning and Brenda hadn’t had any coffee so she’d simply gotten in line when she didn’t see Sharon waiting for her at the usual table.

“What?” she asked confusedly for a moment. “Oh, yes, the suspect tore the ladder from it’s hinges when he fell.”

Sharon had the audacity to snicker.

“It wasn’t very funny.”

“Sounds funny, Chief,” Sharon said with little smirk. She still called her Chief sometimes when they had coffee. It was always Chief in the building, in the corridors when they said hello or in meetings they both had to attend. But sometimes when they were having coffee Sharon called her Brenda, and Brenda called her Sharon.

“They had to catch me,” she said, trying to relay the seriousness of the situation.

“I heard,” Sharon said, squinting up at the menu. They were still too far away to really see but the line was moving forward, albeit slowly. Brenda knew her well enough to know that she was trying not to smile again.

Brenda shook her head and looked away. “Of course you heard,” she muttered.

“Spies everywhere,” Sharon tutted.

“Hmm,” Brenda mocked. That little humming noise the Captain did.

“Hmm,” Sharon hummed back, seemingly not at all bothered and stepped forward when the line moved.

They still argued. They rarely talked about anything of note on these little coffee outings. They’d all but given up on an actual meal, but every Tuesday morning they would meet here at 8. Of course they’d cancelled and rescheduled if one of them was working, but there was no bitterness in the Captain’s replying text message, no lingering resentment at the momentary inconvenience of Brenda not being able to show up. It was easy because the Captain made it so. 

And Sharon Raydor turned out to be like any mother and was pleased to chatter pleasantly about her kids. No real details, just their names and their jobs, but it was enough to fill up the time waiting for their coffee and the walk to work. They bickered still, but there was an easiness to it now, a familiarity. It wasn’t malicious like it had been. The stakes were much lower.

“Fritz doesn’t want me doing that kind of stuff anymore,” she said as they walked out of the café. She wasn’t sure why she said it. But it was bubbling up inside of her and if she didn’t tell someone she might explode.

“Getting stuck in ceilings?”

Brenda scoffed. The woman made it easy sometimes but sometimes she was as difficult as ever. “Nooo,” she drawled. “Chasing robbers and lying in wait and interrogating dangerous people.”

“But that’s your job,” Sharon said so matter of fact that it seemed almost ridiculous to even be talking about it.

“Well,” Brenda sighed, “he doesn’t want me doing it anymore.”

Sharon was silent as they walked. Brenda glanced over after a minute when they rounded the corner and headed toward the building. Sharon was looking dead ahead and sipping her coffee. Her forehead was a little creased where her brow was furrowed. Brenda wanted to reach out and smooth it over, clear away the worry with her fingertips.

Sharon stopped abruptly and Brenda had to turn back to look at her. The sun was still low in the sky and it was dark between all the tall buildings. That must be why Brenda shivered when Sharon looked at her like that. Like they really were friends.

“What do you want to do?” Sharon asked.

Brenda sighed and looked back over her shoulder at the building at the end of the street. As if it could hear their little conversation from a quarter mile off. She looked back and brought her left hand up to cup her drink too. She’d learned after the first week that the latte wasn’t enough. Now her order was a mocha concoction with syrup and sugar and sometimes whip cream.

Sharon rolled her eyes every time Brenda ordered. But Brenda had been running late one Tuesday morning after getting stuck in traffic. And by the time she got to the café Sharon had already ordered the drink for her, whip cream and all. The Captain had memorized the order and had it waiting in her hand.

“I want to stay right where I am,” Brenda answered.

She looked up at Sharon who looked right back at her. Her face was very still and serious.

“Then that’s that,” Sharon said slowly. “You stay.”

They started walking again and Brenda took a large sip of her mocha.

“Chief Delk offered me Pope’s job,” she confessed after another minute.

“I knew he would,” Sharon replied without hesitating. “What did you say?”

“That I didn’t want it.”

Sharon sighed. Brenda thought there’d be a lecture to follow but the Captain just shook her head. They were almost to the building now and the Captain paused again. Brenda turned to her and watched as she raised her travel mug as if in cheers. 

“To doing what we want,” Sharon said.

Brenda smiled and raised her coffee too.

“To doing what we want,” she repeated. 

They drank to that and above them the sun rose a little higher in the sky.


	4. Chapter 4

_It's the kind of cold, fogs up windshield glass_   
_But I felt it when I passed you_   
_There's an ache in you put there by the ache in me_

_'tis the damn season_ \- Taylor Swift 

She didn’t tell Fritz about getting coffee with Sharon Raydor.

It wasn’t a secret and by no means was it something to hide. But it was hers and hers alone, so she didn’t tell him. It simply had nothing to do with him.

She never talked about Fritz when they had coffee, and Sharon Raydor didn’t mention her husband neither. Brenda wasn’t sure there even was a husband to talk about, but the Captain had a ring on her left hand and it gleamed in the sunlight. It was a simple gold band and Brenda wondered why she’d never noticed it before.

She could ask Flynn or Provenza if Captain Raydor was married. They’d known her the longest, went back years apparently. Brenda remembered something about the Captain calling Provenza misogynistic. She smiled at the thought.

It must have been lonely for the Captain, making her way up the ranks. Choosing I.A., quickest way to rank or not, was not the easiest road to be sure. And the Captain’s private life was just that, private. Even if she was married and had some unnamed husband somewhere he certainly wasn’t showing up to the office unannounced or arriving suddenly at crime scenes.

Fritz was typically nothing but helpful at work, although it was hard not to resent the fact that he seemed to have insinuated himself into every facet of her life. He was everywhere and sometimes when she got home from work, she had nothing new to say beyond the same old complaints because he’d been with her all day long.

So, it was nice to have this _thing._ This time in the morning when Captain Raydor walked with her and sometimes didn’t even say anything at all. It was theirs, whatever it was.

No, she wouldn’t ask Flynn or Provenza anything about Captain Raydor.

Anyways, they still didn’t get along at work. Whatever peace there was in the thirty minutes on some Tuesday mornings didn’t always transfer to the working hours of the week. The Captain could still be an awful thorn in her side.

_That woman!_

She certainly lived up to her reputation. The Wicked Witch. The Ice Queen. Nicknames that had probably followed the Captain for years now, though Brenda had only heard them once she’d started dealing with the woman more and more. A whisper here, a rumor there, a drawing on a white board that she didn’t put a stop to because she was so irritated by the other woman’s presence that she let her squad have their fun.

She hadn’t felt bad about that until the Captain bought her coffee. She probably should have felt guilty sooner, but Brenda had always done exactly what she wanted when she wanted. And right now she wanted to try that peppermint mocha thingy that seemed to be on every billboard in Los Angeles. For a place that never seemed to get that cold the city did love its festivities.

“I don’t know how you can drink that stuff,” Sharon said, shaking her head as she watched Brenda drizzle chocolate sauce on top of the whip cream. It was a Tuesday.

“I like chocolate,” Brenda defended hotly. She hadn’t had anything sweet since yesterday and she didn’t know why the Captain insisted on being irritating first thing in the morning. Honestly, this attempt at friendship might not be worth all the effort it took.

Sharon chuckled. “I know.”

Of course she knew. The candy drawer in her desk wasn’t a secret, and sometimes it was something she shared. Doling out chocolate to her squad when they needed it, Provenza reaching in for a ho ho when he had to tell her something she really didn’t want to hear. Flynn grabbing her a kit kat from the vending machine and leaving it on her desk whenever they saw Raydor coming at a crime scene. But the candy drawer was sort of like these mornings with the Captain; something she didn’t talk about.

They still hadn’t run into anyone they knew. Everybody knew they couldn’t stand each other, and for some reason Captain Raydor seemed hesitant to break that illusion. Although sometimes it didn’t feel like an illusion. Brenda’s instantaneous annoyance at the sound of the woman’s heels on linoleum was quite real.

“It’s seasonal,” Brenda said, pointing at a poster on the wall of a candy cane stuck into a coffee. “I’m just bein’ festive,” she huffed as she drizzled one last streak of chocolate sauce.

Sharon just shook her head and had that barely there smirk.

“I can’t believe it’s the first week of December,” Sharon said as they walked. “I haven’t finished all of my shopping.”

“Oh,” Brenda said lamely. “Yeah, me neither.”

She almost always forgot about Christmas shopping. It just wasn’t something she was very good at. Not high on her list of priorities. Anyhow, Fritz usually got himself anything he wanted, although he usually would point out that he’d bought it himself.

“I’m going to Park City to go skiing with my kids,” Sharon said. “We go every year.”

“Right,” Brenda said, tucking a strand of hair behind her hear. Guess they were sharing holiday plans. She took a quick sip of her coffee. It was too sweet, ridiculously sugary and chocolaty. It was perfect. “My parents are comin’ all the way from Atlanta in their RV.”

“That’s a long drive,” Sharon replied.

“Yes,” Brenda agreed. “But they don’t mind the driving.”

They walked a little further in silence. The sound of sirens echoed in the distance. It was slightly chilly this morning, about as cold as Southern California could get. Brenda didn’t envy Sharon’s trip to snowy Utah.

“Do you ever miss it?” Sharon asked.

“Miss what?”

“Georgia,” Sharon said slowly, like she was explaining a simple idea to a child.

Brenda rolled her eyes at the tone.

She took another sip and thought for a moment. She could feel the Captain glancing over at her. They were nearly to the building. Their time was almost up.

“No,” Brenda answered carefully. “I’m not that person anymore.”

She expected the Captain to ask another question, but she only made that humming noise and reached for the door first. The Captain held it open as Brenda stepped through. They walked together across the lobby and into the empty elevator and all the way up.

“See you later, Chief,” the Captain murmured even though they were all alone.

“Bye-bye, Captain Raydor,” she said as she walked. She turned back and caught a quick glance of the Captain as the elevator doors slid closed. The Captain was leaning against the wall, holding her coffee in one hand and the other in the pocket of her trench coat. Her head was tilted back against the wall and her eyes were shut.

Brenda opened her mouth to say something, that the other woman looked tired all of the sudden. But the doors came together before she could say anything, and the elevator went and took the Captain up and away.

…

The next Monday Major Crimes caught a case just as the sun was setting. Brenda spent most of the night at the crime scene, looking at blood splatter patterns and listening to Tao talk about ballistics. The scene was a mess, loud and crowded and right by a nightclub that drew spectators as the night went on. They lined the yellow tape and watched as her squad worked.

Sanchez interviewed the witnesses and Gabriel talked her through the timeline. Provenza growled and Flynn cracked a few inappropriate jokes. A typical Monday night.

She didn’t get home until late and she’d forgotten to cancel.

She was so tired when she walked in. She looked at the whiteboard that was only half up. Details were still missing and they didn’t have pictures of the suspects yet. Only Tao and Provenza were in the Murder Room. She marched past them and into her office, gracelessly dropping her purse down on the chair. She glanced down at her desk and saw a coffee cup with her name on it.

_Oh, for Heaven’s sake._

She stuck her head out of her office.

“Have you seen the Captain?” she asked sharply.

“Which Captain?” Provenza asked without putting his donut down. A little bit of jelly dripped down onto his tie.

“Captain Raydor,” she said exasperatedly.

Tao was writing on the whiteboard and he paused, arm in midair. He turned to look at her, already nervous.

“She walked right into your office,” he said apologetically. “And then left. Didn’t say a word.”

Provenza glared at Tao who shrugged and turned back to writing.

Brenda ducked back into her office and closed the door. She glanced through the glass at the Murder Room. Tao was still writing and Provenza was back to eating his donut. She carefully closed the blinds, then went to her desk and sat in her chair. She stared down at the coffee cup, like it was going to spring to life and start talking.

She’d never been to Internal Affairs, didn’t even know what the Captain’s office looked like. It was probably neat and tidy and perfect. She didn’t even know the Captain’s extension.

She could text her to say thank you, like her mother would want. She _should_ text her.

Instead, she picked up the cup, took a careful sip and grinned at the taste of peppermint.

…

A man got hit by a patrol car so it most certainly was a Use-of-Force Investigation. The Captain wasn’t having it.

They were in the morgue again, arguing.

Brenda tried not to be put out by the information that the Captain’s father was sick. She’d never mentioned it. Wouldn’t friends mention that sort of thing?

Anyway it was gonna be easier and more efficient to work the case together, avoid law suits and that kind of thing. So there they were again, sitting side by side in the interview room. The little notebook sitting in front of the Captain as she leaned down a bit and scribbled, her hair a curtain between them. Brenda could smell her shampoo but couldn’t quite place the scent. The woman smelled fresh and clean and Brenda almost asked what product she used but Gabriel was talking about Italy, and the airline wanted seven hundred dollars from the Captain if she was gonna change her ticket, so they just kept walking and walked right into her parents.

Sanchez had an elf hat on and the murder room was decked out with paper snowflakes dangling from the ceiling and tinsel taped to filing cabinets. The entire team was wrapping presents and her parents were in the thick of it. It was a little jarring, going from an interview to this and maybe that’s why she said it.

“This is my Captain Raydor.”

She stumbled over the words, finally getting them out.

“My friend Sharon Raydor.”

Her entire squad was watching, and her husband was looking at her strangely. She didn’t look back to see the Captain’s face but the woman shook her parents’ hands firmly and gave them both a dazzling smile when they said they hadn’t met a friend of Brenda’s since she graduated high school.

“Well, here I am!”

As if it was a miracle Brenda Leigh Johnson finally had a friend. As if some strange cosmic event had brought them together and made them whatever they were now. Chief Johnson and her friend Sharon Raydor.

Another body turned up, this time a woman with scars that told a grim tale. They stood side by side in the blue gowns as Dr. Morales talked about far flung places and troubled parts of the world. Violence that lasted generations and grudges that went back centuries.

The Captain walked away from the body, stepping back into a corner. Not visibly shaken, but quieter and more withdrawn. She crossed her arms and looked at the ground and Brenda remembered when she’d almost broken down at the sight of Ally Moore with bruises on her arms and cheek.

A rainstorm had been promised for days now, and the sky over Los Angelas had been gray and full of frigid rain. Brenda shivered as the cold of the morgue and the sky seeped into her through the gown and her clothes and right down to her bones.

…

Fritz stole the Christmas presents. And the microwave too, for good measure.

It would keep her parents out of California, but Brenda felt bad all the same.

They found another body, and Flynn stood at the white board, methodically crossing out Holiday plans and shaking his head at the grimness of it all. The Captain hadn’t even made it to the airport when she had to turn back. They didn’t make a merry bunch, even with the smell of fried okra and cornbread wafting out of the break room.

A family ruined by one person and his desire to run away from the things he’d done. War crimes and other atrocities. Things Brenda hadn’t dealt with in a long time. She shook her head, trying to clear it of the look in Mrs. Marku’s face as her whole world crumbled within the span of one conversation. Brenda walking her through it, tearing her world apart piece by piece and following her into the bathroom. She stood outside the stall, waiting silently as the woman vomited over and over until she had nothing left.

They stood together by the sink and hatched a plan to catch him and catch them they did.

But at what cost? For Skander, it was everything.

Brenda poked at the food on her plate and watched her father hold court at the end of the table. Fritz was talking with Gabriel, and her mother was playing hostess, going to and fro bringing and taking plates and drinks. Taylor was still wearing Provenza’s Santa suit, and the computer screens all had Yule logs flickering on them.

The Captain was a little ways down the long table, sitting next to Dr. Morales. The case had marooned him too, making him too late to get to Palm Springs to spend Christmas with his boyfriend’s family. The two of them were sitting close, leaning in and smiling. Thick as thieves. She hadn’t known they were friendly, although she guessed she’d never seen them interact outside of the morgue. The Captain seemed lighter somehow. Her smile genuine. Brenda even heard her laugh at one point. The sound was soft and the laugh was done behind a hand covering her mouth, but Brenda heard it all the same. She tried not to keep looking at them and ate the sweet potatoes on her plate before her mother made a scene about not eating enough.

When the meal was over the Captain stood up and placed a hand on the doctor’s shoulder. She squeezed and leaned down to say goodbye. The whole squad seemed disinterested, but her mother asked where she was off to.

“To find a way to get to the airport,” Sharon said politely. “The airline offered me the last seat on a plane going out at midnight.”

Brenda had promised her a police escort to L.A.X, but it was way past that. It was almost 8pm, and everyone was a little drowsy from the meal. The Captain needed a ride to the airport for her red eye flight to Utah, and Brenda heard herself offer one.

Maybe it was to get out of clean up duty and driving her parents back to the house with Fritz in the car. Or maybe she was just getting into the Holiday spirit. It didn’t matter because the Captain said yes as Willie Rae watched them, and after a few halfhearted goodbyes and vague gestures of farewell from the squad, she followed Brenda down the hallway and to the elevator.

“You really don’t have to, Chief,” she said halfheartedly. “I can get a taxi.”

“Oh, never mind that,” Brenda dismissed with a wave of her hand as she hit the button for the lobby. “My mama would have killed me if I didn’t offer.”

“Hmm,” the woman hummed.

“And anyway, I did promise you a police escort.”

The Captain sighed but was quiet all the way to the car. Brenda opened the trunk for her and watched as she placed her suitcase carefully in the back. They settled into the front seat and the Captain cleared her throat as she crossed her legs and buckled her seat belt.

“You’re a terrible driver,” the Captain observed before they’d even made it a mile from the building.

“I drive just fine,” Brenda muttered as she got honked at by some lunatic in a Land Rover. Honestly, who needed that kind of vehicle in Los Angeles? “It’s everyone else in California.”

“Right,” the Captain scoffed, but Brenda could hear the smile in her voice.

She glanced over and saw the woman looking out the window. Brenda looked back at the road.

“So, you like the cold?” she asked after a few minutes of relative quiet. The radio was playing Christmas music with the volume on low, and the Captain seemed tired enough that the quiet wasn’t uncomfortable. They always seemed to get along best when they didn’t say much.

The Captain hummed, reaching up to push her hair back a bit. “My family likes to ski, and that happens to be an outdoor winter activity.”

Brenda rolled her eyes and gripped the steering wheel tightly. “Just makin’ conversation,” she mumbled. Maybe she should have just let the woman take a taxi. Or made Morales take her instead, since they were so friendly.

“You did well on the case,” Sharon murmured.

Brenda glanced quickly over at the woman. She was still looking straight ahead, giving nothing away.

“Thank you,” Brenda answered after a moment.

“You used to deal with that kind of thing, I heard,” Sharon said casually, like it was nothing.

“You heard?” Brenda asked, her voice suddenly as cold as the rainclouds above their head.

Sharon shrugged. “I did a little investigating on you when I filled out your application for Chief of Police.”

“You what!” Brenda sputtered. Someone honked at her and she honked back without thinking and Brenda resented the sight of Sharon reaching out to hold onto the side of the door. As if they were about to crash and die just because Brenda honked at someone.

“It’s standard procedure,” Sharon said in that clear, smooth voice of hers.

“It’s rude is what it is,” Brenda said hotly.

Suddenly they were in traffic. The cars in front of them slowed down and the highway became a sea of red break lights. Even on Christmas Los Angeles would have this kind of traffic. Brenda sighed and leaned back in her seat. They’d still get to the airport in plenty of time, but Brenda had started to regret her one good deed of the season.

“You must have been quite impressive, to be so young and have that kind of reputation,” the Captain said as the traffic creeped forward a few feet. 

“I did things,” Brenda said hesitantly. “Things no one in LA knows about.” She sighed and looked behind her to see if she could switch lanes. She was suddenly unsure where they stood, unmoored and out at sea in raging waters as Sharon Raydor casually told her she knew about the CIA, about who she was before. Had known since the whole Chief business started.

The Captain was still looking straight ahead, her hands delicately folded in her lap. Her legs were crossed. She looked so prim and proper, even on her way to the airport.

“Still,” the Captain said softly. “I’m sorry I missed it.” Then she cleared her throat and uncrossed and crossed her legs again the other way. Like she was uneasy all the sudden. Restless. “Although you are still quite formidable, when you want to be.”

“That almost sounds like a compliment, Captain” Brenda pointed out.

Sharon smiled that little smirk and Brenda almost forgave her.

Eventually traffic started again, and they made their way slowly but surely. Brenda took the exit for LAX, rolling her eyes every time Sharon gave her directions. She put her turning signal on and followed the curve of the exit round and round. They pulled up to the curb next to Departures and Brenda got out too, even though there was only the one bag and it had wheels on it. Not at all cumbersome or heavy.

“Thanks again for the ride,” Sharon said as they stood facing each other on the pavement. The captain’s hand was tight on the handle of her suitcase.

“My pleasure,” Brenda said.

“We even beat the rain,” the Captain finished lamely.

Brenda smiled in response.

They stood on the curb and looked at each other, as if both unsure what to do next. People were coming and going, hugging and greeting each other and echoes of “Merry Christmas” were all around them. A couple from the car in front of them kissed goodbye and Brenda shivered as they separated and one of them turned back before going into the terminal. 

Sharon sighed after they had stood still a moment too long and reached out to place her hand gently on Brenda’s forearm. Purposeful and graceful and perfect. She leaned in before Brenda knew what was happening and kissed her softly on the cheek.

“Merry Christmas, Brenda,” she murmured against her skin.

Her lips were soft and barely there, and Brenda heard her own breath hitch at the contact.

Sharon let go of her arm and turned, disappearing behind the sliding glass doors along with the feeling of Brenda’s cheeks on her lips and the crowd of holiday travelers.

Brenda stood there and watched, as if waiting for the Captain to do something. To turn around. To look back.

But Sharon didn’t turn back, and she vanished around the corner without a second glance. 

Brenda shivered and got into her Crown Vic as it started to rain. The storm that had threatened to burst all week finally arrived and it poured the whole way home.


End file.
